Document processing facilities often use high speed document processing machines such as sorters to sort and direct mail items appropriately to one or more mail bins for distribution. The efficiency of a sorter is generally dependent upon various factors, including the rate at which mail items can be fed into a mail transport and subsequently transported along a transport path via a system of belts, mechanized levers and rollers, the ability for the address components (e.g., recipient address, ZIP code, bar code) marked upon the mail items to be identified by a reader device for association of each mail piece with a sort scheme managed by a sort scheme computer and the number of mail items that can be effectively stacked by a mail stacker into one or more mail pockets or bins in accordance with the specified sort scheme.
In more advanced sort operations it may be necessary to purposefully cut a mail piece during transport, such as in accord with a desired cut pattern, to render full opening for extraction of contents within the mail piece or to reveal previously concealed information as enveloped by or located on the mail piece. In the latter case, a segment of the mail piece sufficient for revealing the concealed information is cut. The revealed information may then be imaged, interpreted and conveyed as input data to the sort scheme computer to affect which mail bin that mail piece is ultimately directed. Of course, when applying cutting techniques to a mail piece during transport, it is important to avoid measures that invariably damage the mail piece or restrict the ability of an imaging/reading device to interpret the information placed thereon—i.e., ripping, puncturing or wrinkling the mail piece. Unfortunately, most approaches employed today for selective cutting during processing involve the use of a grinder, slitter or blade mechanism—i.e., a mechanical milling, cutting or grinding device. These cutting techniques, however, are generally limited in its application, because of the difficulty in stabilizing and positioning the cutter and the mailpiece in a fast transport. They are more prone to either damaging the contents or making an insufficient cut because a setting that works for thick mail will not be the best for thin mail. This limitation is even more severe with mixed mail with different envelope materials. What is needed, therefore, is a means for enabling effective cutting of mail pieces during transport to ensure cut accuracy and to promote readability. In particular, the ability to adaptively adjust a cut profile and other cut parameters in accord with the positioning of the mail piece to achieve a desired cut pattern while accounting for high transport speed is of particular importance.